11,836 stories by "Trav S.D."
Great News, comedy lovers! Our friends at BearManor Media are offering something great in support of I’ll Say She Is. Donate $50 to the new production and receive a $50 …
Today is the birthday of the actor Chester Morris (John Chester Brook Morris, 1901-1970). Many people know Morris primarily as the star of the Boston Blackie serials from the 1940s. I …
Filed under: Contemporary Variety, Magicians/ Mind Readers/ Quick Change, PLUGS Tagged: Adam RealMan, Cardone, House of Magic, magic, Slipper Room
Happy Presidents Day! Officially this is a day on which to celebrate George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, but I’m viewing it as a good opportunity to write about several others in ad…
Filed under: Burlesk, Contemporary Variety, Indie Theatre, PLUGS, Valentine's Day Tagged: Laurie Beechman, Le Scandal, Miss Bonnie Dunn, Valentine's Day
Filed under: Burlesk, Contemporary Variety, PLUGS, Valentine's Day Tagged: burlesque, Burlesque-a-Pades, Pontani, Valentine's
Filed under: Contemporary Variety, PLUGS, Valentine's Day, Vaudeville etc. Tagged: Filthy Gorgeous Burlesque, Highline Ballroom, Shelly Watson, Valentines Spectacular
Today is the birthday of one of the last of great actor/managers William Faversham (1868-1940). I was tempted to include him in our Hall of Hams, but though Faversham was a great dramatic ac…
Filed under: Amusement Parks, Brooklyn, Coney Island, Dime Museum and Side Show, PLUGS, SOCIAL EVENTS Tagged: 2016 Spring Gala, Coney Island USA, Fred Kahl
Filed under: Burlesk, Indie Theatre, PLUGS Tagged: Hollywood Honeymoon, Le Poisson Rouge, The Love Show
Today is the birthday of tennis great “Big Bill” Tilden (1893-1953). Long a symbol of the Roaring Twenties, Tilden was the World #1 tennis player from 1920 through 1925, won seve…
Today is the birthday of Roy D’Arcy (Roy Francis Giusti, 1894-1969). I am wracking my brains this morning as to how he ever got onto my radar — and I think it is because I saw hi…
Today is the birthday of the great midwestern humorist, author and playwright George Ade (1866-1944). I’ve already blogged here about his Fables in Slang and other humor, incl…
Today is the birthday of Alma Rubens (Alma Genevieve Reubens, 1897-1931). Originally from San Francisco, Rubens started out when still a teenager as a chorus girl in musical comedies. There …
 Today is the birthday of Valerie Bergere (Valerie Zenobia de Beaumont Lieb, 1867-1938). Borne in Alsace-Lorraine, she moved to to the San Francisco area with her family some time prior t…
1910 Mardi Gras revelers on Frenchman Street, New Orleans photographed by John N. Teunisson, (via Trashy Diva).
Today is the birthday of Laura Ingalls Wilder (1867-1957), a distant cousin of mine via our mutual ancestor Edmund Ingalls (1586-1648) of Lynn Massachusetts, my (10th) great grandfather. …
Today is the birthday of Pat Harrington, Sr. (1901-1965). Â This performer came onto my radar just a few weeks ago, when his better known son Pat Harrington, Jr. (of The Steve Allen Show a…
There is apparently a maxim in the genealogy field, something along the lines of “Genealogy without documentation is fairy tales.’ It’s meant to be an aspersion, but frankl…
Filed under: Contemporary Variety, Indie Theatre, PLUGS, Valentine's Day Tagged: Ten Foot Rat Cabaret, Under St. Marks
Today is the birthday of S.Z. “Cuddles” Sakall (1883-1955). Like most film buffs, I knew this performer well, but never learned his name until our friend Nora mentioned it one da…
Today is the birthday of Berta Beeson (Herbert “Slats” Beeson, 1899-1969). Billed as the Julian Eltinge of the Wire, Beeson was a cross-dressing tightrope walker. It is not known…
Today is the birthday of the great Hollywood film director John Ford (John Feeney, 1894-1973). Ford is too large a topic for a single blogpost. I’ve done a few smaller ones on him to d…
Jules Bledsoe (Julius Lorenzo Cobb Bledsoe, 1897-1943), was an operatic baritone, one of the first African Americans to gain acclaim on the American stage. Much like Paul Robeson, in additio…
Today is the birthday of the great American humorist S.J. Perelman (1904-1979): see my original essay on him here. One of the perks of having written a popular book is that you develop many …
